


A thief in the apocalypse

by oursisthefury



Category: Avatar: Legend of Korra
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, i really like kai
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-17
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-22 23:14:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8304934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oursisthefury/pseuds/oursisthefury
Summary: Kai screws up a lot, but luckily for him, he meets Korra and she can fix everything. Even the apocalypse.





	1. Chapter 1

The young boy scampered away, sack bulging with stolen goods, a grin on his face. "Get back here!" The angry fire bender shouted after him, hurling fireballs at him with skilled accuracy but ever since the thief had acquired air bending, the shots weren't actually accurate even to hit him. He dodged by propelling himself upward with a burst of wind as a flame narrowly missed him. He propelled himself higher and latched onto a crumbling rooftop, pulling himself up as the older boy caught up with him. "Better luck next time, Mako." He smirked down at the older boy who was seething. He'd been stealing from him for a while. They were easy, first of all the younger brother, Bolin, as he had learned his name, was too trusting. Kai, to rub it in further, grabbed an apple out of his satchel and sunk his teeth into it, gloating as the juices ran into his mouth. Where had they even gotten all this food? They always had good pickings. The dark haired boy turned to walk away when a fireball sped his way causing him to topple over. Uh oh. He hadn't expected Mako to do this, where was Bolin to stop him?

"Get down here now! Or else!" The pointy haired boy with the peculiar eyebrows shouted up at him, fists clenched in fury. "Or else what?" Kai retorted stupidly. "Or else you're dead." Mako said coldly and the young thief swallowed in fear. He couldn't mean dead "dead", right? Kai was just a kid.. He couldn't help it if the two teens weren't better at holding onto their food. It was a post apocalyptic world state, they had to be better than that. He reached for the apple he had dropped and placed it in his bag, carefully getting to his feet. "Well?" The fire bender asked impatiently. "Ok, ok. I'm coming down." The boy lied and the others body relaxed slightly, until Kai sent a stream of roof tiles right on top of him and took off.

The thief panted as he ran across the roof and jumped to another, he hadn't seen anything happen unless Mako had a slow reaction time. He turned around to see and a roar of flames appeared where Mako had been standing, so slow reaction time it was. He had a head start at least, the older one wouldn't stray too far from his brother. He readied himself to make another jump from the roof and as he did so, a flame shot up at him vertically and caught him by surprise, sending him plummeting to the ground. "Oww." Kai groaned rubbing his head, as he had slammed it on the ground from falling backwards, he also rubbed his backside too which was also bruised. When he looked up his eyes met the icy gold eyes of Mako who was standing right over him, arms crossed. 

"Ohh.., hey, Mako." Kai said nervously, sweat dripping from his face. He was in trouble now. Mako had finally gotten fed up. "Um," was all he managed to get out as he tried to say something again because the fire bender grabbed him by the front of his shirt and slammed him up against the nearby wall roughly. Kai was aware of how far he was up the ground, this wasn't good. "Any last words, punk?" The older demanded voice cold and steely, he brought up his other hand and produced a flame right in front of Kai's face. "Can't we talk this over?" Kai asked hopefully, gripping onto the others hand which currently held him ass he squirmed to get away from the flame. "What?" The fire bender seethed, he sounded so venomous. "Do I even have to remind how much you've stolen from me and my brother?" He snapped. "Hey, that's your own fault. Survival of the fittest. You didn't guard it well enough." The thief protested and his captors face grew more enraged. The flame in his hand grew larger too. "Oh? And I suppose kill or be killed fits in this situation, huh, Kai?"

Kai swallowed, he didn't see an easy way out of this situation. "Please don't kill me, Mako." He begged, eyes welling up with tears. The fire bender rolled his eyes. "I guess I can just take back what you stole as long as you don't mess with me or my brother ever again. You hear me?" "I hear you." The young boy nodded, as the flame in his captors hand disappeared and he relaxed his grip, reaching for the bag. When the others face was downward from Kai's, his tears had turned into a scowl, he wasn't going to give up so easily. He lurched forward and bit down on the others hand, drawing blood and causing the other to cry out in pain and release him. He then blasted Mako away with a quick shoot of air, but in the struggle Mako had been able to tear the bag off him when he was sent flying much to the younger's disappointment. He then noticed that the fire benders signature red scarf had flown off and was now lying on the ground. With a devilish grin, he picked it up and wrapped it around his own neck and saw how quickly he got a reaction out of the other. Mako had just sat up, furious, but victorious with the bag but then he saw his most prized possession in the hands of the thief. "No..!" His eyes widened. "Give that back, Kai!" He shouted, getting back on his feet.

Kai heard the frantic-ness in the others voice and considered giving it back when from out of nowhere the other blasted a stream of blue lightening at his feet, the ground exploded in front of him and the blast knocked him back into the wall, cracking his head off of it. He reached back and felt blood dripping from the back of his head, and he stared at it, eyes wide and frightened. He felt like a small child. He didn't ever remember bleeding, or the blood being this red. He was aware of how much his head hurt and how his vision was blurred. He knew this was the last straw. He was dead.

Mako watched as the kid backed up against the wall, trying to make himself appear smaller. At that point, the fire bender had lost all reasoning. He had lost his family, killed right in front of the both of them, the world was ruined and now there was this brat who thought he could steal without getting punished for it. Mako had had enough. He focused all his fury into his fire and his hands erupted in flame. The flames danced off the small boys frightened eyes and illuminated Mako's dulled over ones. With everything he could muster, he struck.

The thief shielded his face from the blow but knew it wasn't of any use, it was over. But then, the blow didn't come. He looked out from his hands and saw a rock wall had stopped the fire. "Mako!" He heard Bolin's familiar voice. "Stop!" His younger brother cried and Kai peeked out to see him holding his brother back. Bolin's worried eyes met Kai's scared ones and he shouted "Run!" To Kai as Mako struggled against Bolin's grip. The youngest one didn't need to be told twice, he was gone leaving the two behind. He had forgotten to remove the scarf tho.

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His lungs ached from running so hard. He couldn't believe that Mako had actually followed through on his threats for once and that was frightening. Kai finally reached his hiding spot, a small hole leading inside a building smashed against other buildings and exhaled sliding against the wall. He had made it out alive. He bit his tongue to stop from crying out when he saw that he still had the scarf on. Why did he put it on? He was Mako's tormentor, the fire bender had every right to attack him. He was so stupid. He scrunched himself up in a ball and cried, choking on his tears, he never had cried for so long and so hard before.

Kai blinked rubbing his swollen eyes, it was now dark out. He had fallen asleep for a bit. His stomach let out a growl of protest. "Shut up." He told it with a groan. It was his own fault he didn't have any grub. Maybe he could go find someone sleeping who he could steal from. It was worth a shot, as long as he didn't run into the cannibalistic groups he had heard so much about. They liked young meat like him. He shuddered to think about it, what if Mako wanted to eat him for stealing his scarf and so much of their other food? It was a horrifying thought. 

The moon was especially bright and made sure that not everything was pitch black, thankfully for the young thief. He trekked his way through the broken town, searching in every nook and cranny. As he was passing a boulder from a house, he noticed a figure sitting in the middle of a clearing. He quickly ducked behind it and peeked out at who it was. The light of moon made visibility easier and he saw there was a young woman there, around Mako's age. She had dark skin like he did and dark hair (assumedly) and she was wearing a water benders outfit. She was sitting, legs crossed in front of a pile of sticks, attempting to make a fire. Kai thought this was silly since she wasn't a fire bender and she didn't appear to have any matches, but then he saw something that made his eyes widen in surprise. The girl produced a flame with her hand and lit the sticks. But she was dressed like a water bender, unless it was a disguise to catch people off guard or something...

Then she reached into what he saw was a bag and pulled out a pear and bit into it. Kai was aware that he was drooling just then, he was so hungry. But how was he going to get her food? She wasn't asleep and she was a fire bender...


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is kind of split up weird. I'm sorry, but I don't want to mess around with it.

In looking on at the young woman, the thief mistakenly stepped on a twig causing her to look his direction immediately. Her clear blue eyes met his and he ducked behind the rock, breathing heavily. Maybe she hadn't seen him? Aw, who was he kidding? He had been right out in the open. She looked right at him. Please don't say anything, please don't come after me, please think you were imagining it, he prayed, heart pounding as he pressed his back up against the boulder. But his prayers weren't answered.

"Hey, is anyone there?" She asked, her voice sounded tough but kind. A no nonsense type of gal but with a kind heart. "You can come out. I won't hurt you. I have plenty of food to share." She offered charismatically. Kai considered the offer, if she was that trusting to trust people out here then maybe he could steal her food? He shrugged and stepped out into the fire light. 

She smiled at him and offered him a seat next to her by the fire. Hm, she probably thought he was a harmless kid, he was slightly offended. "My name's Korra. What's yours?" She questioned, creating conversation. "It's Kai." He responded as she handed him a roll of bread, he examined it with wonder, how had she gotten bread? No one had bread nowadays. She was very strange. "I like your scarf." She said motioning to the stolen scarf around his neck. "Thanks, a friend gave it to me." He lied. "Except I don't know what happened to him.. You know, after everything..." Korra nodded her head in understanding. "I don't know where my friends are either.." She looked down at the fire, eyes distant and sad. "But I've made it my mission to find them!" She exclaimed thrusting a fist in the air. "Do you even think you'll find them?" The younger asked, finishing his bread. "I don't know, but I need to try and I need to hope." She answered. "Why?" "Because I'm sure if they're ok then they're looking for me too."  
He stopped asking her questions then.

Korra yawned, stretching and he noticed then how muscular her arms were. Scary. "I think I'm going to try and get some sleep, how about you, Kai?" She said, flopping down on the dirt. "Yeah, me too." He agreed. She actually trusted him? What an idiot. He waited a while until her breathing evened out and she definitely seemed asleep and then he struck. He carefully got up and lifted the bag up and away from her resting body and as he began to sneak away, a noise sounded out. It was something like a roar of bear and a bark of a dog combined and it made a shiver run up his spine. "Mhm," Korra groaned, opening an eye and then staring at him as he stood there frozen with her food. "Hey!" She shouted, moving to get up but he blasted her with his air bending. As he was sprinting away, he heard her cry out "Naga!" 

What the hell did "Naga" mean? He wondered but then he heard the sound of heavy steps behind him. They sounded hurried and hefty, he also heard panting, heavy breathing and then the same deafening noise. Kai turned around and saw a massive white shape coming right behind him or preciously, right for him. As it neared him, he saw that it was a humongous dog. It had a huge head, bear shaped, with a big mouth full of sharp looking fangs, it's tongue lolled from its mouth, big and pink and it had huge bear like paws. So essentially it was a bear dog? Polar bear dog?

"Ahhh!" Kai cried out in terror as the dog bore down on him and pulled him to a halt by snagging its teeth on the back of his shirt collar and essentially lifting him off of the ground with ease. It stopped after grabbing him and then turned tail and ran back to its master. It was a fast ride back, the dog took huge bounds as it ran, it had superior speed too. "Come on, let me go!" The boy whined to it but it took no heed of him and pressed on with its mission.

Swiftly they appeared back at Korra's camp site, she had been still sitting but as her dog came closer she got to her feet, with one hand on her hip and stared questionably at the boy hanging out of the animals mouth. "Good girl, Naga!" She cooed as the dog sat down with a sizable whump, its tail beating against the earth happily at being praised. Although she didn't tell the creature to drop him. He just hung there guiltily, avoiding her eyes.

"So, Kai, that's not a very good way to make friends, you know. Stealing their food in the night." She commented. "I think you would've gotten away with it if it weren't for Naga here." She gestured to her dog. "Look, I'm sorry! Don't let your dog eat me, please!" He cried out in a panic. "I just, that's all I've always known, stealing and being on my own even if someone's nice to me... Don't hurt me!" He was ashamed at himself for his begging and his behavior.

"Wow, wow. Calm down, kid." She said to his surprise. "I'm not going to do anything to you and Naga certainly doesn't eat people, especially not kids." "Really?" He asked surprised. "Yeah. I know I can't really relate to your situation since I have a family, but I always think people deserve second chances." The bender declared. "You can still join me, the offer still stands." What? He was amazed by this girl. 

"I mean, I can protect you." Korra stated. "And I'm pretty good at finding food plus fending off dangers, so whaddya say, Kai? Do you want to join me and Naga?" He would be stupid to say no to such an offer. "Yes! Yes, I want to join you!" Kai cried out and Korra grinned, leaning over and ruffling his hair affectionately. "Drop him, Naga." She commanded her companion and the beast obliged her by dropping the thief gently to the ground. As soon as his feet reached the ground, he leapt at Korra wrapping his arms around her waist in a hug. "Thank you for giving me chance." He said, tearing up slightly. "Woah, kid." She said smiling, and hugging him back. It was like they were family. He had never had one before and now maybe she could be his big sister?

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They sat back around the fire, the two of them using Naga as a backrest as the heat warmed them. "So what's with the water bender getup?" Kai asked relaxing against the fur wall. "I saw you fire bending, so is the water bender outfit a disguise?" Korra stared at him blankly before she snorted with laughter. "What? What's so funny?" He demanded, he didn't get the joke. "Oh, well," she said wiping a tear from her eye. "I am a water bender." Now it was Kai's turn to give her a blank look. "And a fire bender." She supplied. "That's not possible. Prove you're a water bender then." He challenged. Korra shrugged and opened up a canteen of water she had strapped to her and sure enough, she bent the water right in front of him. The young boy did a double take, rubbing his eyes to make sure he was actually seeing it and not dreamily imagining it. "How..." He mouthed, mouth hanging open.

"Simple. I'm the avatar." She said. "The what?" Kai was confused. "The avatar. Master of all elements. I can earth and air bend too."


End file.
